Chiang Mai - A Great Place To Visit

[Mapguy]

Chiang Mai might be a nice place to visit for you! Perhaps a place you might want to live.

The weather is great (Remember, it is the tropics!) most of the year, but totally forget mid-February - early April. The air is quite polluted then. Some days you have absolutely no idea where the environmental natural beauty of the place is! Unless you are sleeping it off in hotel rooms in preparation for your next night on the bar scene (which isn't very extensive), but that's not the environment I had in mind.

There are hotels at all prices, and the fancy ones are really quite cheap now. The sad part now is that you could fire a bazooka down the halls of most of them now and not damage a thing! You see, a couple of Thai governments ago, some promises were made about mega-development in Chiang Mai including casinos. That sucked in a lot of investment from some seemingly wise heads, like Holiday Inn, Meridian, and Shangri-La, to name three! But, not to worry, if you get to the right village around Chiang Mai city at the right time, there are plenty of cockfights to bet on.

There are some very good restaurants in Chiang Mai. And a lot of medioce and not-so-good restaurants. Street stalls? Some are quite good. You do have to be careful, sometimes, where you eat, but don't get paranoid about it. Take the appropriate medicine, if you need to, but don't worry about it! On the other hand, if you want to know where the best hamburger is, the best tuna fish sandwich, and so on, check out TV Chiang Mai. Otherwise --- has anyone mentioned "Thai" food? --- don't bother looking on TV Chiang Mai! On the other hand, there is McDonalds, and places which serve fish and chips, if you must have that sort of thing.....but then, why leave home?

There are bars with bar girls and other joints. If you think it is cool to stuff money down g-strings and buy lady drinks, perhaps you might stay in Bangkok or go to Pattaya, which are much faster towns with a lot more opportunities for that sort of thing. It is rumored that they sell sex by the second in those places!

If you pack tea bags and are looking for restaurants with hot water, please stay home and visit your local parks, sit on park benches and strike up conversations with passing pigeons! Nobody wants you here! Backpackers with rich parents and/or American Express are, however, welcome.

If you are looking to retire, this isn't a bad place --- if you understand living in the tropics in a different culture and don't expect things to be just like back home, only cheaper. If you don't, go live with your kids. Seriously, stay home! Please! Seems most of the complainers and otherwise very boring people here are folks on skimpy pensions from Sioux City, Iowa, USA, or the West Midlands, UK, or the outskirts of Queensland, Australia, who worry about getting "ripped off" on exchange rates for a nominal ATM charge when they need extra cash to go to McDonalds! Get a life! Free banking wasn't included in the demands of the Magna Carta!

If you are looking for a lover and figure on supporting him/her/undecided by opening up a restaurant, prepare to starve, perhaps slowly, perhaps more rapidly, depending upon the size of your pension!

If you work one year and then figure you can travel here, shoot your wad, then go home, don't plan on your honey to wait pure and with baited breath for your return.

I'm on a sort of roll here. Anyway, it is late.

Anyone want to add some "If you....." suggestions?!

[IanForbes]

You pretty much nailed it, mapguy. But, it is like most free countries in the world, life is what you make it; it's all up to the individual. For me, Chaing Mai is an ideal size city... not too big and not too small. There is something for everyone, but not an over abundance of anything. There's no need to live in anyone's back pocket if you don't want to. You can easily walk across the city if you are reasonably fit. Certainly it is missing many things we take for granted in most western countries, but that's also part of its beauty. There have been many threads on what there is to do in Chiang Mai, so there is no need to repeat them. As a non-Thai speaking farang, Chiang Mai offers enough English speaking outlets to make a tourist or expat comfortable. With the exception of Phuket, Bangkok and the Pattaya area, that is more than I can say for most other cities in Thailand.

[gpdjohn]

Good one Mapguy!

[Rasseru]

Well done, Mapguy, but I'm curious, what got you all wound up for that, if you know?

Oh, and by way of offering a small favour in return for your large one, you wanted to write in there that one's honey would not wait for one with 'bated' breath; for her to wait with 'baited' breath, with a view to landing another lover, is a real possibility.

Edited May 23, 2009 by Rasseru

[PeaceBlondie]

...and Rasseru isn't even an English teacher...or a British pedant.

I do like the size of Chiang Mai. Okay, so you can't order Ethiopian takeout food after 2 AM; there is no Benelli dealer. But you can get anything you want here, including Alice or her brother, without going to Bang-cock or Patyerass.

[iainiain101]

Chiang Mai might be a nice place to visit for you! Perhaps a place you might want to live.

The weather is great (Remember, it is the tropics!) most of the year, but totally forget mid-February - early April. The air is quite polluted then. Some days you have absolutely no idea where the environmental natural beauty of the place is! Unless you are sleeping it off in hotel rooms in preparation for your next night on the bar scene (which isn't very extensive), but that's not the environment I had in mind.

I agree with most of the post, except this. Whilst the smog is bad, my 70 year old parents were here for the whole of March (in fact extended their stay by a week) as they liked having the smog 'umbrella' to the sun. They found they could walk for a few kms around town without getting too hot. So not everyone need avoid CM.

Personally I would prefer no smog, but I must admit it did make playing golf during March 'cooler'.

Iain

[Rasseru]

...and Rasseru isn't even an English teacher...or a British pedant.

No . . . but I play one on TV.

[alant]

"There are hotels at all prices, and the fancy ones are really quite cheap now. The sad part now is that you could fire a bazooka down the halls of most of them now and not damage a thing! You see, a couple of Thai governments ago, some promises were made about mega-development in Chiang Mai including casinos. That sucked in a lot of investment from some seemingly wise heads, like Holiday Inn, Meridian, and Shangri-La, to name three! But, not to worry, if you get to the right village around Chiang Mai city at the right time, there are plenty of cockfights to bet on"

i always find government promises of a liberal policy of being able to to decide as an adult openly and legally to engage in certain types of entertainment brings a smile to my face How do investors fall for it?

you would have thought that when such thai companies such as chang decide to float in singapore the message was pretty clear.

fortunatly thailand is so wealthy it does not need to follow this path

[Puwa]

On a roll or on a troll?

[Steve2UK]

...and Rasseru isn't even an English teacher...or a British pedant.

PB - take another demerit . I've had cause to remind you before - it's "teacher of English (language)". The otherwise excellent Rasseru is, of course, not English.

On the plus side, good to see you draw the distinction between we British pedants and the more ordinary varieties.........

[PeaceBlondie]

English who think they're not British are like Southerners in the USA who think they are not Yankees.

P.S. It's not really English language - it's more like half German.

[elektrified]

Nice one Mapguy! I pretty much agree with most of what you said.

Cheers

[Rasseru]

English who think they're not British are like Southerners in the USA who think they are not Yankees.

A little off there, I'm afraid, PeaceBlondie. Are Scots who think they're not British like Yankees in the USA who think they are not Southerners? In fact, Scots who think they're not English would be like Southerners in the USA who think they are not Yankees. And they'd both be right. An Englishman who thinks he's not British would be like a Yankee who thinks he's not an American. Too bad, so sad for them both, but it just ain't so.

Another lesson for you, courtesy of TV pedantry.

[Tyke]

Chiang Mai might be a nice place to visit for you! Perhaps a place you might want to live.

The weather is great (Remember, it is the tropics!) most of the year, but totally forget mid-February - early April. The air is quite polluted then. Some days you have absolutely no idea where the environmental natural beauty of the place is! Unless you are sleeping it off in hotel rooms in preparation for your next night on the bar scene (which isn't very extensive), but that's not the environment I had in mind.

There are hotels at all prices, and the fancy ones are really quite cheap now. The sad part now is that you could fire a bazooka down the halls of most of them now and not damage a thing! You see, a couple of Thai governments ago, some promises were made about mega-development in Chiang Mai including casinos. That sucked in a lot of investment from some seemingly wise heads, like Holiday Inn, Meridian, and Shangri-La, to name three! But, not to worry, if you get to the right village around Chiang Mai city at the right time, there are plenty of cockfights to bet on.

There are some very good restaurants in Chiang Mai. And a lot of medioce and not-so-good restaurants. Street stalls? Some are quite good. You do have to be careful, sometimes, where you eat, but don't get paranoid about it. Take the appropriate medicine, if you need to, but don't worry about it! On the other hand, if you want to know where the best hamburger is, the best tuna fish sandwich, and so on, check out TV Chiang Mai. Otherwise --- has anyone mentioned "Thai" food? --- don't bother looking on TV Chiang Mai! On the other hand, there is McDonalds, and places which serve fish and chips, if you must have that sort of thing.....but then, why leave home?

There are bars with bar girls and other joints. If you think it is cool to stuff money down g-strings and buy lady drinks, perhaps you might stay in Bangkok or go to Pattaya, which are much faster towns with a lot more opportunities for that sort of thing. It is rumored that they sell sex by the second in those places!

If you pack tea bags and are looking for restaurants with hot water, please stay home and visit your local parks, sit on park benches and strike up conversations with passing pigeons! Nobody wants you here! Backpackers with rich parents and/or American Express are, however, welcome.

If you are looking to retire, this isn't a bad place --- if you understand living in the tropics in a different culture and don't expect things to be just like back home, only cheaper. If you don't, go live with your kids. Seriously, stay home! Please! Seems most of the complainers and otherwise very boring people here are folks on skimpy pensions from Sioux City, Iowa, USA, or the West Midlands, UK, or the outskirts of Queensland, Australia, who worry about getting "ripped off" on exchange rates for a nominal ATM charge when they need extra cash to go to McDonalds! Get a life! Free banking wasn't included in the demands of the Magna Carta!

If you are looking for a lover and figure on supporting him/her/undecided by opening up a restaurant, prepare to starve, perhaps slowly, perhaps more rapidly, depending upon the size of your pension!

If you work one year and then figure you can travel here, shoot your wad, then go home, don't plan on your honey to wait pure and with baited breath for your return.

I'm on a sort of roll here. Anyway, it is late.

Anyone want to add some "If you....." suggestions?!

mm... Actually Chiang Mai is really boring.

[orang37]

Sawasdee Khrup, TV Friends,

Good post, Khun MapGuy !

With regard to "bated" and "baited" :

http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-bai1.htm

"Shakespeare is the first writer known to use it, in The Merchant of Venice, in which Shylock says to Antonio: “Shall I bend low and, in a bondman’s key, / With bated breath and whisp’ring humbleness, / Say this ...”. Nearly three centuries later, Mark Twain employed it in Tom Sawyer: “Every eye fixed itself upon him; with parted lips and bated breath the audience hung upon his words, taking no note of time, rapt in the ghastly fascinations of the tale”."

I hope to not appear here in a droll, troll, role, or as frantic pedantic antic. My farang's thing for etymology has a lot to do with his pathology.

best, ~o:37;

[Rasseru]

Sawasdee Khrup, TV Friends . . .

I hope to not appear here . . . as frantic pedantic antic. . . .

best, ~o:37;

Sawasdee Khrup, ~o:37 :

I should hope not -- dat's my territory, buddy!

[Flatouthruthefog]

Chiang Mai might be a nice place to visit for you! Perhaps a place you might want to live.

The weather is great (Remember, it is the tropics!) most of the year, but totally forget mid-February - early April. The air is quite polluted then. Some days you have absolutely no idea where the environmental natural beauty of the place is! Unless you are sleeping it off in hotel rooms in preparation for your next night on the bar scene (which isn't very extensive), but that's not the environment I had in mind.

There are hotels at all prices, and the fancy ones are really quite cheap now. The sad part now is that you could fire a bazooka down the halls of most of them now and not damage a thing! You see, a couple of Thai governments ago, some promises were made about mega-development in Chiang Mai including casinos. That sucked in a lot of investment from some seemingly wise heads, like Holiday Inn, Meridian, and Shangri-La, to name three! But, not to worry, if you get to the right village around Chiang Mai city at the right time, there are plenty of cockfights to bet on.

There are some very good restaurants in Chiang Mai. And a lot of medioce and not-so-good restaurants. Street stalls? Some are quite good. You do have to be careful, sometimes, where you eat, but don't get paranoid about it. Take the appropriate medicine, if you need to, but don't worry about it! On the other hand, if you want to know where the best hamburger is, the best tuna fish sandwich, and so on, check out TV Chiang Mai. Otherwise --- has anyone mentioned "Thai" food? --- don't bother looking on TV Chiang Mai! On the other hand, there is McDonalds, and places which serve fish and chips, if you must have that sort of thing.....but then, why leave home?

There are bars with bar girls and other joints. If you think it is cool to stuff money down g-strings and buy lady drinks, perhaps you might stay in Bangkok or go to Pattaya, which are much faster towns with a lot more opportunities for that sort of thing. It is rumored that they sell sex by the second in those places!

If you pack tea bags and are looking for restaurants with hot water, please stay home and visit your local parks, sit on park benches and strike up conversations with passing pigeons! Nobody wants you here! Backpackers with rich parents and/or American Express are, however, welcome.

If you are looking to retire, this isn't a bad place --- if you understand living in the tropics in a different culture and don't expect things to be just like back home, only cheaper. If you don't, go live with your kids. Seriously, stay home! Please! Seems most of the complainers and otherwise very boring people here are folks on skimpy pensions from Sioux City, Iowa, USA, or the West Midlands, UK, or the outskirts of Queensland, Australia, who worry about getting "ripped off" on exchange rates for a nominal ATM charge when they need extra cash to go to McDonalds! Get a life! Free banking wasn't included in the demands of the Magna Carta!

If you are looking for a lover and figure on supporting him/her/undecided by opening up a restaurant, prepare to starve, perhaps slowly, perhaps more rapidly, depending upon the size of your pension!

If you work one year and then figure you can travel here, shoot your wad, then go home, don't plan on your honey to wait pure and with baited breath for your return.

I'm on a sort of roll here. Anyway, it is late.

Anyone want to add some "If you....." suggestions?!

mm... Actually Chiang Mai is really boring.

Actually, old chap, he who is tired of Chiang Mai must surely be tired of life.......!

[Flatouthruthefog]

English who think they're not British are like Southerners in the USA who think they are not Yankees.

P.S. It's not really English language - it's more like half German.

And which half would that be?

The 'high German' half, one hopes and assumes.......

[WaiWai]

What might "unabaited breath" be?

Agree very much on the whole, Mapguy. For foreigners, CM -- and perhaps Thailand, generally ('scuse the pun ), -- is becoming more and more a place to live out your later years.

For younger people, it is a good place for short-term escape, but the wish to grow and be challenged will soon send many off to explore the multitude of very exciting other regions our world has to offer.

[Rasseru]

What might "unabaited breath" be?

That would be 'unabated breath'. Something like what we would have now if we were having this dialogue using our voices instead of our fingers.

[WaiWai]

Could be the "nam plaa" ?

[mcgriffith]

IMO Chiang Mai is a great place to live, not visit.

I've never been a short-timer; most of my international travel over the last 35 years has involved extended stays in various places, like Bali, Peru, Kabul, etc.

Sure CM (and Thailand) has its warts and blemishes. As does every other place on the planet. Sometimes when I read the BKK Post, and I read some of the political news, I want to scream......

But I don't let it get to me. Right now I have to go back to California to visit family for the first time in 3 years...and I am dreading the trip.

Like the old expression- jumping out of the frying pan, into the fire.

My home state is bankrupt, 15% unemployment, everyone is struggling to survive. From hero to zero in 15 seconds, and everyone I talk to there is on a serious bummer, dude.

I don't know where Valhalla exists on this earth, and I've lived in many places. Different strokes for different folks, to use another hackneyed phrase...

We need to learn to be thankful and happy for what we have, but still be cognizant of the faults and defects.

And try to do something to correct those deficits....

[Mapguy]

McG wrote, And try to do something to correct those deficits.... smile.gif

Yes, why not?!

Two things strike deeply at the willingness to get involve and help. One is anomie, a sense of aloneness/helplessness in a group or a place. The other is just selfishness.

Now, to talk about permanent expatriates, not visitors. On a "here and now" plane in Chiang Mai, I see potential in small and perhaps larger ways, depending upon the skills and interests of expatriate members of the community. There are real opportunities to really become genuine members of the community far beyond the idle chatter about the best restaurants in town one reads on TV Chiang Mai. Indeed, the current mayor (problematic as her situation may currently be) has always said we are all Chiang Mai people/citizens. And Thailand has a long heritage of accepting and working with people from other places if they have something constructive to offer.

I am often accused of being oblique in my posts. Well, fair enough. But what I guess I am saying is that, for those who wish to live here, do get involved in a constructive way, don't just live here because it is tolerant, comfortable, and can be relatively cheap. Don't start, of course, with a "know-it-all-let-me-tell-you-how-or what's-wrong-here" approach!

Anyway, thanks to the spelling mavens who caught my spelling error in the OP!

[orang37]

That would be 'unabated breath'. Something like what we would have now if we were having this dialogue using our voices instead of our fingers.

Sawasdee Khrup, Khun Rasseru,

I postulate that "unabated breath" could be a sideroxylon, since "breath" is, ipso facto, an act, a motion. I hope you do not find this hypothesis intransigently paraconsistent !

I think Khun Wai Wai could be on to something with "unabaited breath," however : imagine a scenario in which a person is a professional bait-chewer : if we accept that "a" here is used in its suffix form, meaning "without," then, when said bait-chewer finishes work, they can be said to have unabaited breath (even though a double-negative is always a stretch). After they use Listerine or a stick of the Neem tree, or whatever : to have abaited breath ?

I once loved an Orang female who had a forked tongue : one time she wanted to kiss me, and there was bait on one side of her tongue only. I could tell her breath was baited, and dodged the kiss, getting a large hicky on my right ear, instead. But I never would have guessed which side of her tongue the bait was on : she told me that, though, after she tied me up with jungle vines. We were incompatible, I think, because she was into swinging, and I just wanted to use a vine to get to a nice place in the tree to sit and eat fruit, and scratch my you-know-where itches.

That's why Chiang Mai is such a great place to visit, for me : because bait here is worth taking, even if you do get hooked, sometimes.

unabatedly, yours, ~o:37;

[anonymouse]

Chiang Mai might be a nice place to visit for you! Perhaps a place you might want to live.

The weather is great (Remember, it is the tropics!) most of the year, but totally forget mid-February - early April. The air is quite polluted then. Some days you have absolutely no idea where the environmental natural beauty of the place is! Unless you are sleeping it off in hotel rooms in preparation for your next night on the bar scene (which isn't very extensive), but that's not the environment I had in mind.

There are hotels at all prices, and the fancy ones are really quite cheap now. The sad part now is that you could fire a bazooka down the halls of most of them now and not damage a thing! You see, a couple of Thai governments ago, some promises were made about mega-development in Chiang Mai including casinos. That sucked in a lot of investment from some seemingly wise heads, like Holiday Inn, Meridian, and Shangri-La, to name three! But, not to worry, if you get to the right village around Chiang Mai city at the right time, there are plenty of cockfights to bet on.

There are some very good restaurants in Chiang Mai. And a lot of medioce and not-so-good restaurants. Street stalls? Some are quite good. You do have to be careful, sometimes, where you eat, but don't get paranoid about it. Take the appropriate medicine, if you need to, but don't worry about it! On the other hand, if you want to know where the best hamburger is, the best tuna fish sandwich, and so on, check out TV Chiang Mai. Otherwise --- has anyone mentioned "Thai" food? --- don't bother looking on TV Chiang Mai! On the other hand, there is McDonalds, and places which serve fish and chips, if you must have that sort of thing.....but then, why leave home?

There are bars with bar girls and other joints. If you think it is cool to stuff money down g-strings and buy lady drinks, perhaps you might stay in Bangkok or go to Pattaya, which are much faster towns with a lot more opportunities for that sort of thing. It is rumored that they sell sex by the second in those places!

If you pack tea bags and are looking for restaurants with hot water, please stay home and visit your local parks, sit on park benches and strike up conversations with passing pigeons! Nobody wants you here! Backpackers with rich parents and/or American Express are, however, welcome.

If you are looking to retire, this isn't a bad place --- if you understand living in the tropics in a different culture and don't expect things to be just like back home, only cheaper. If you don't, go live with your kids. Seriously, stay home! Please! Seems most of the complainers and otherwise very boring people here are folks on skimpy pensions from Sioux City, Iowa, USA, or the West Midlands, UK, or the outskirts of Queensland, Australia, who worry about getting "ripped off" on exchange rates for a nominal ATM charge when they need extra cash to go to McDonalds! Get a life! Free banking wasn't included in the demands of the Magna Carta!

If you are looking for a lover and figure on supporting him/her/undecided by opening up a restaurant, prepare to starve, perhaps slowly, perhaps more rapidly, depending upon the size of your pension!

If you work one year and then figure you can travel here, shoot your wad, then go home, don't plan on your honey to wait pure and with baited breath for your return.

I'm on a sort of roll here. Anyway, it is late.

Anyone want to add some "If you....." suggestions?!

and there's me thinking Stream-of-consciousness writing died with William Burroughs

Edited May 23, 2009 by anonymouse

[WinnieTheKhwai]

IMO Chiang Mai is a great place to live, not visit.

I think it's a great place to visit, too. Beats Bangkok (and most other Thai cities) by a mile, for starters.

Who would honestly enjoy visiting things like markets and temples more in in Bangkok? Chiang Mai is just so much nicer, more convenient and more beautiful.

When you live here a long time it perhaps becomes harder to see what the attractions would be for a short visit, because you see those things every day.

Whenever I feel like I need a reminder I go stay somewhere in the old town area, wake up at 6 or 7am and walk around. It's good to give you a reminder sometimes. It's all too easy to forget about the attractions living in some compound in the San Sai area and rarely getting beyond Carrefour.

Edited May 24, 2009 by WinnieTheKhwai

[purplehaze]

IMO Chiang Mai is a great place to live, not visit.

It's all too easy to forget about the attractions living in some compound in the San Sai area and rarely getting beyond Carrefour.

Are you speaking about yourself or having a pop at the people living in compounds in San Sai or Chiang Mai in general?

[WinnieTheKhwai]

Generally speaking, including myself. I believe that showed from the context that disappeared from your quote!

The point I made is that Chiang Mai IS interesting for a shorter or longer visit as a tourist, and that when you live a long time in a place you get so used to the interesting sights that they perhaps don't register as much as they used to. But to tourists they DO register. This applies especially when you get stuck in a rut (yes, including myself), it's especially good to go be a tourist every once in a while and take a walk around Chiang Mai town not long after dawn and see what goes on, look at the people, the vendors, the monks, the houses, the markets and temples.

[NaiGreg]

Another lesson for you, courtesy of TV pedantry.

I keep my canned goods and onion rolls in the pedantry.

I think you mean to say 'pedantry-ism.'

-NG

Edited May 27, 2009 by NaiGreg

[IanForbes]

IMO Chiang Mai is a great place to live, not visit.

I think it's a great place to visit, too. Beats Bangkok (and most other Thai cities) by a mile, for starters.

I agree that Chiang Mai beats Bangkok by a country mile. In Bangkok it is just too difficult to get around. Once you visit the King's palace, the temple of dawn (Wat Arun) and take a few boat rides on the canals it's like any other huge metropolis... just too dam_n big. There are good and bad places to eat everywhere. Plonk me down in a Four Seasons Hotel (or any other big chain hotel) anywhere in the world and I would have a hard time knowing what country I'm in. Shopping is something that women do. If you don't believe me then compare the number of shops related to the separate sexes in any mall everywhere in the world.

Living on day to day life means dealing with people. Most of us don't have time for more than a few good friends. Everyone is busy doing their own thing. Unless you can fluently speak the language of the country you are living in the advantage of living in a big city over a town or village becomes negligible. If you can get everything you need in a small city or town then there are no advantages to living in a large city.